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SPEECH 



OF THE 



HON. R. C. WINTHROP, OF MASS.. 



^\ 



ON 



THE PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE; 



DELIVERED 



IN COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
OF THE UNITED STATES, FEBRUARY 21, 1850. 





WASHINGTON: 

PRINTED BY GIDEON & CO., 
1850. 



SPEECH 



1 do not rise, Mr. Chairman, to enter elaborately into the general discus- 
sion to which the annual niessao-e of the President of the United States has 
given occasion. But finding myself under an unexpected necessity of 
leaving my seat for a week or two, I have been unwilling to go, without 
making a few remarks, which I feel to be due to my owri,.^osition and 
character. 

I have abstained (bus far from any expression of opinion or declaration 
of purpose, in regaid to the unfortunate sectional controversies by which our 
country is now agitated. I have done so designedly , and for many reasons, 
satisfactory to myself, if to nobody else. 

In ihe first place, sir, I desired to wait until the excitement growing out 
of (hat protracted struggle for the Speakership — to which, by the unmerited 
favor of my friends, I was so prominent a party — had passed away from the 
minds of all who were engaged in it; and until I could express myself fully 
and fearlessly upon these controverted topics, without (he suspicion of being 
influenced by any thing of private resentment or personal disappointment. 

In the second place, sir, I desired to wait until something of that fervent 
and flaming heal, which had been so evidently brought here from what may; 
well be termed ''the warm and sunny South," had abated; until the angry' 
passions, which seemed pent up within so many bosoms at the outset of the 
session, had found vent through the safe and wholesome channel of debate; 
and until there could be a chance that a calm and dispassionate voice from 
"the cold and calculating North" might be listened to with some degree of 
patient attention. 

In (he third place, sir, I desired to wail until matters should be rather 
more clearly and fully developed; until all the ciicumstances of the case 
should be before us; until we should have been able to take an observation 
of the precise position of the precious vessel in which we are all embarked; 
until we could ascertain, if possible, what is the real length and breadth, 
and heighih and depth, of that fearful chasm, (bat yawning abyss, upon the 
dizzy brink of which, we aie told, the Ship of Slate is even now poising her- 
self; until we could learn, too, what course might be proposed by older, and 
abler, and more experienced hands, for extricating her from peril; and until, 
especially, we might hear distinctly, above the roar of the elements and the 
rattling of the shrouds, the voice of the responsible man at the helm— the 
man who has been placed at the helm by a majority of the crew, with my 
own cordial concurrence; and who, by the blessing of God, I hope, and trust, 
and believe, is destined to be hailed by us all hereafter as "the Pilot who 
has weathered the s(orm !" ^ , 

These, Mr. Chairman, are some of the views with which I have thus' 
far abstained, and would gladly have still longer .'abstained;, from any parti- 



cipation in that strife of tongues which has so long been raging around us — 
a strife, let me say, which has seemed to me likely to have no more im- 
portant or practical issue, than that which was chronicled by one of the 
sacred historians in regard to a quarrel among the Hebrew tribes, when he 
summed up the whole matter by saying — '-'and the words of the men of 
Judah weve fiercer than the words of the men of Israel." 

But, sir. I have not been permitted to pursue ih'is e vpectant si/stein, as an 
honorable member of the medical faculty near me, (Mr. Venable,) would 
probably call it — I have not, I say, been permitted to pursue this course of 
silent observation without interruption. It appears to have been the stu- 
dious policy of a few members of this House to drag me into the debate, 
whether I would or no. Not satisfied with having accomplished my defeat 
a? a candidate for re-election to the Speaker's chair — a defeat, sir, which, in 
a^l its personal incidents and consequences, I have ever regarded as the most 
fortunate of triumphs, and over which no one of my enemies has rejoiced 
more heartily than myself — not satisfied with the accomplisfunent of this 
result, they have made it their special business to provoke and taunt me by 
unworthy reflections upon my political and oflficial conduct; and inore than 
one of them has not scrupled to assail me with the coarsest and most un- 
warrantable peisonalities. 

It is my purpose, sir, at this moment, to notice some of these unmannerly 
assaults; and no one will be surprised, I think, if I should be found doing 
so in no very mincing or measured teriris. 

Indeed, Mr. Chairman, both the House and the country will bear wit- 
ness, that I have been placed in a somewhat extraordinary position during 
the present session of Congress. Hardly had I reached the capital, before 
I found myself held up, at the length of three or four columns, in the 
Democratic organ of this city, as a desperate Abolitionist. The Abolition 
papers, in reply, exhibited me at equal length, as, indeed, they had often 
done before, as a rank Pro-Slavery man. The honorable member from 
Tennessee. (Mr. Andrew Johnson,) coming next to the onslaught, and 
4oing me the favor to rehearse before my face a speech which he had de- 
livered behind my back at the last session, arraigned me in the most fero- 
cious terms as having prostituted the prerogatives of the Chair to sectional 
purposes, and as having framed all my committees in a manner and with a 
view to do injustice to the South. The honorable member from Ohio, (Mr. 
GiDDiNGS,) following him, after a due delay, denounced me, with equal 
violence, as having packed the most inqiortant of those committees for the 
purpose of betraying the North. The one proclaimed me to be the very 
author and originator of the Wilmot proviso. The other reproached me as 
being a downright, or, at best, a disguised, enemy to that proviso. The 
one exclaimed, as the very climax of his condemnation, "I would sooner 
vote for Joshua R. Giddings himself than for Robert C. Winthrop." 
The other responded with an equally indignant emphasis, '^and I would 
sooner vote for Howell Cobb than for Robert C. Winthrop — he can- 
not do worse, he may do better." Nay, I presume it is safe to say, that the 
honorable member is now of opinion that he has done better , since not only 
has the honorable member secured for himself a place on the Territorial 
Committee, but the report of the a^jii-slavery convention, at their late meet- 
ing in Boston, has remarked upon it as '"a curious and instructive fact, that, 
in the composition of comtaitte^s, Mr. Cobb has given more weight to the 



I 



5 

anli-slavery element of the House than was done by his northern predeces- 
sor." How far this is true, I leave others to pronounce. 

But the honorable members from Tennessee and Ohio, (par nobile fra- 
trum !) have not been the only contributors to this most amiable, consistent, 
and harmonious testimony in regard to my public conduct and character. 
An honorable colleague from Massachusetts (Mr. Allen) has cast in his 
mile, also, both by prompting others at his elbow, and by the manlier 
method of direct accusation. He, too, has charged me with liaving arrang- 
ed certain committees, with the deliberate purpose of preventing the action 
which northern men demanded. And more recently, again, an honorable 
member from Virginia, (Mr. Morton,) in a speech which, I take pleasure 
in saying, was characterized by entire courtesy, if not by entire justice, has 
told the House and his constituents that he voted against me as Speaker, 
because -'he believed me to be in favor of the Wilmot proviso; because he be- 
lieved me to be in favor of the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia; 
and because my name was found in a minority of forty-five against the ad- 
mission of Florida as a slave Stale." 

Sir, if my name were a little less humble than I feel it this day to be — 
if I were not conscious how small a claim it has to be classed among the 
great names even of our own age and country, much more of the world, I 
should be tempted to console myself under these conflicting accusations with 
those noble lines of Milton — whicli, as it is, I cannot but remember: 

"Fame, if not double-faced, is double-tongued, 
And with contrary blast proclaims most deeds; 
On botji his wings, one black, the other iv'hite, 
Bears greatest names in his wild aery flight." 

But indeed, Mr. Chairman, I need no consolation. H^hese contradictory 
charges are the natural consequence of the very position which I have 
sought to occupy — of the very position which I glory this day in occupying — 
and from which no provocations and no reproaches can ever drive me. 

Sir, when I was first a candidate for Congress, now some ten winters 
gone, I told the Abolitionists of my district , in reply to their interrogatories, 
that, while I agreed with them in most of their abstract principles, and was 
ready to carry them out, in any just, practicable, and constitutional man- 
ner; yet, if I were elected to this House, I should not regard it as any pe- 
culiar part of my duty to agitate the subject of slavery. I have adhered to 
that declaration. I have been no agitator. I have sympathized with no 
fanatics. I have defended the rights and interests and principles of the 
North, to the best of my ability, wherever and whenever I have found ihem 
assailed; but I have enlisted in no crusade upon the institutions of the South. 
I have eschewed and abhorred ultraism at both ends of the Union. "A plague 
o' both your houses," has been my constant eiaculalion;and it is altogether 
natural, therefore, that both their houses shoidd ciy a plague on me! I 
would not have it otherwise. I dote on their dislike. I covet their oppo- 
sition. I desire no other testimony to the general propriety of my own 
course than their reproaches. I thank my God that he has endowed me, if 
with no other gifts, with a spirit oC moderation, which incapacitates me for 
giving satisfaction to ultraists anywhere and on any subject. If they were to 
speak Well of me, I should be compelled to exclaim, like one of old," what 
bad thing have I done, that such men praise me?" 

The only thing which I have to regret, Mr. Chairman, is, that these va- 



nous charges could not have been made against me in one and (he same 
debate, and on one and the same day. They would then have effectually 
answered each other. They would (hen have fairly shamed eacli other 
out of Court, and I should have been spared the necessity of even this 
brief allusion to them. 

But, sir, the list of my accusers is not yet complete. Another honorable 
member from Ohio, (Mr. Root,) has recently taken the field against me, 
and has seen fit to make, what, if it were entirely parliamentary, I should 
be constrained to call, some very impertinent allusions to my course in refer- 
ence to a resolution of his, which was recently laid on the table. I was 
accidentally in the Senate chamber when his speech was delivered, but my 
attention has been called to it in a late number of the Congressional Globe. 

Sir, when the honorable member first ofifered his resolution, some weeks 
since, I united with my friends of the free States in saving it from the fate 
which it then merited, and which it has since received. I thought it then 
a most premature and precipitate movement, and there are those near me 
who can bear witness, that notwithstanding my exalted sense of the honor- 
able member's habitual wisdom and prudence, 1 could not repress the ex- 
clamation — 

" Tlius fools rush in, where angels fear to tread !" 

I yielded, however, to the suggestions of those around me, that it might 
be as precipitate to lay it on the table at once, as it was to offer it; and that 
there would be no harm in taking time to consider it. A fortnight inter- 
vened, and I did consider it in all ils bearings. And as the honorable mem- 
ber has been so plain and unceremonious with me, in ascribing motives and 
ealling names, I shall be equally plain and unceremonious with him in tell- 
uig him what I thought of his resoluhon. 

I regarded it, Mr. Chairman, considering all the ciicumstances of Con- 
gress and of ihe country, as one of the most mischievous propositions ever 
introduced into this House. I regarded it as mischievous in its inevitable 
consequences, and as mischievous in its deliberate design. I came to the 
eonclusion that the honorable member, for the sake of a little tniserable no- 
toriety, had wantonly put in peril the very cause of which he professed to be 
the peculiar champion — (hat for the sake oi playing captain, and marching 
ahead of the music, he had been willing to take the risk of sacrificing the 
very fortress of which he assumed to be the defender. I believed, in one 
word, sir, that if that resolution were persevered in, in the existing condi- 
tion of this House and of the country, all hope of practical legislation would 
be extinguished, the great measure of the admission of California, as a 
State, into this Union, would be impeded, obstructed, and finally defeated; 
and that the session would be one j^rotracted scene of strife, confusion, and 
discord . 

And why, then, sir, entertaining these views of the resolution, did I not 
vote upon the second motion to lay it on the table ? For this is the part 
of my conduct which the honorable member has taken in such especial dud- 
geon, and which he has made the pretext for applying to me certain contu- 
melious epithets. 

Well, now, I do confess, Mr. Chairman, that I was a little malicious in 
withholding my vote on this particular occasion . It would have been so very 
gratifying to the honoiable member, if he could have only had me once fairly 



on the record J where he has never yet had me, against a resolution contain" 
ing, as one of its elements, the Wilmot proviso ! It would have furnish- 
ed such an excellent apology for him and his friends for having voted 
against me f».s Speaker, and for having thrown the organization of this 
House into the hands of a Southern Democrat! It would have been such 
a telling free-soil card in the next canvass in the fourth district of Massachu- 
setts, to say nothing of the twenty-first district, I think it is, of Ohio! In- 
deed, sir, it was certainly a litde cruel to deprive the honorable member of 
an advantage upon which he had so confidently calculated. 

But I believe it is Solomon who has said," Surely in vain is the net 
spread in the sight of any bird." Sir, I saw the trap which the honorable 
member had laid for me. I knew that he and his peculiar friends were 
lying in wait for me. I knew they were seeking to find a justification, 
after the event, for an opposition to me for which they had so little apol- 
ogy beforehand. I saw that he had framed his resolution so that, whether 
we voted for or against it, we should be placed in a false position. If 
we voted not to lay it on the table, and seemingly sustained the resolution, 
we were to be held up as abandoning General Taylor and the Ailministra- 
tion. If we voted to lay it on the table, we were to be denounced as ene- 
mies to the principles of the ordinance of '87. I understand that the iion- 
oiable member said, in advance, that he would either have our votes or our 
scalps. I know not the precise meaning which is to be attached to this 
humane and elegant expression, if he really used it. It might be well, 
perhaps, to refer it for inquiry to the Committee on Indian Affairs. If he 
only intended, by this tomahawk threat, that he would deal a few slabs at 
my character behind my back, he is welcome to all theglory of the exploit. 
But whatever he meant, I did not intend that he should have eiiher my 
vote or my scalp, if I could help it; and seeing that my vole would make no 
diflference to the result, I declined to gratify his desire to ensnare me. 
And now, because the trap of the honorable member failed to work, in the 
only casein which it was of special importance for him that it should work, 
he flies into a passion, strips off his neck-cloth, and begins to scold about 
dodging and skulking ! 

Why, sir, the honorable gentleman forgets himself. Certainly his speech 
forgets itself; for, in the very same paragraph in which he upbraids me for 
my course in this case, he describes his own course in another case, as en- 
tirely identical with it. 1 would not ask a better justification from anyone, 
than that which the honorable member himself has furnished me out of his 
own mouth. Hear what he says, sir, as to his own conduct at the late 
Presidential election: 

" It was nothing more (says he) but a game at the best. I neither wanted 
to cheat nor to be cheated, and hence I took no part in it. I stood out.^^ 

Does it not lie admirably in his mouth, to charge others with skulking, 
and to exclaim so heroically, " it is better to vote wrong than to dodge," 
when, in the very same breath, he is boasting that he skulked himself from 
the great Presidential struggle ! 

Nor is this the only instance of the same sort in the honorable member's 
history. What else but dodging was his conduct in the protracted contest for 
the Speakership? Wliat did he do but throw away his vote to the end oa 
an impossible candidate? What did the eight peculiar free soilers do, but 
pair off, four from each party, and, by neutralizing each other, virtually not 



8 

vote at all — virtually dodge ^ by refusing to vote so as to make any diflference 
to the result? Sir, there are those here who believe, that the first great 
desertion of northern principles at this session has been exhibited by those 
who have thrown the organization of this House into the hands of a southern 
Democrat. Of that the honorable member stands convicted. And, my 
opinion is, that any one who considers the adroit and ingenious manner in 
which it was done, by seeming to vote and yet practically not voting at all — 
will come to the conclusion, that if the honorable member desires to see the 
true '■'•Artful Dodger'''' of the day , he must look at home. 

Nor is this all, Mr. Chairman. The honorable member has made a great 
vaunting of what he would have done on the last night of the last session, 
if the Walker amendment had been longer persisted in. The more im- 
portant inquiry, sir, is, what did he do? Where was he during the weary 
watches of that memorable night? Where was he when the honorable mem- 
ber from Tennessee (Mr. Andrew Johnson) moved to strike out the word 
" impartial" from the vote of thanks lo the (Jhair? Who then was " will- 
ing to wound, but yet afraid to strike?" Wiiere was he, too, when the 
honorable member from Kentucky (Mr. Morehead) moved that most mo- 
mentous amendment to the Walker proviso in regard to the rightful boun- 
daries of Texas? His name is not on the record; and, thougli the proverb 
is somewhat musty, sir, I cannot help reminding the honorable member, 
that '' those wlio live in glasshouses should not throw stones." 

But he tells us most pathetically , that the Wilmot proviso has been wound- 
ed in the house of its friends; nay, that so far as this House could kill it, it 
has been killed. Well, now, sir, this remains to be seen. Doubtless, the 
honorable member finds it for his purpose, at this moment, to think so, at least 
to say so. But it remains to be seen whether the great principles of the or- 
dinance of '87 have lost any portion of their vitality; whether (hey have not 
as strong and living a hold on the hearts of other northern and western men 
as on thai of the honorable member himself; and whether, on the proper 
occasion , if a real necessity or a reasonable demand for their assertion and 
maintenance should arise, they would not be asserted and be maintained by 
as laige a majority in this body as they ever have been heretofore. I be- 
lieve they would be. 

But this I do say — that if these principles have been wounded and struck 
down; if it be true, that, by laying on the table an unseasonable resolution 
of the honorable member from Ohio, we have killed the Wilmot proviso — 
its death must lie forever at his door, and not at ours; and the true inscrip- 
tion on its tombstone will read thus: " Here lies a victim to the restless 
vanity and headstrong rashness of the honorable member from Ohio, who 
held it deliberately up to receive its deathblow, in order to gratify his pas- 
sion for notoriety, and his pique against some of his old friends of the Whig 
party." 

Why, sir, the conduct of the honorable member on this occasion was 
what a French philosopher has called " worse than a fault." It was a mis- 
take — a fatal blunder. It was a moment of all others when the North should 
not have been called on to show its hand; when gentlemen from tlie free 
States should not have been required to say what they would do, or what 
they would not do, in regard to the Territories; and my only regret is, that 
the resolution could not have been suffered to go upon the table by south- 
ern votes only, with the mere silent assent of northern men. It was the 



precise case for what the honorable member has called " staoding out," 
and for the reservation of all expression of opinion or intention, until a real 
exigency for such an expression had occurred. And I repeat, sir, that if 
the northern force has been weakened, and the northern front broken, it is 
owing to the rasli and precipitate 'charge which was attempted under the 
assumed and illegitimate lead of the honorable member from Ohio. 

But there are some men, we are told, who are '' wiser in iheir own con- 
ceit than seven men who can render a reason." The honorable member, 
and his little squad, insist upon regarding themselves as the only persons in 
the country, or, certainly , as the only persons in this House, who know how 
to defend northern rights, or how to vindicaieihe great principles of human 
freedom. Nay, sir, they modestly claim to be the only ones who desire, or 
who are even willing, to defend or vindicate them. All the world are 
dousrhfaoes (as they elegantly style it) except themselves! They alone are 
loyal to human liberty! They are the only reliable defenders, or legitimate 
occupants, of the great free-soil field! Surely these are the men, and wisdom 
shall die with them! 

I cannot listen, Mr. Chairman, to these arrogant assumptions and offen- 
sive pretensions, without calling to my aid the castigation which was ad- 
ministered by Edmund Burke, (not of the Union, sir,) to one of the petty 
cabals which infested Great Britain during the period of the Fiench revolu- 
tion, and which were attempting, as he said, " to hide their total want of 
consequence in bustle and noise, and puffing, and mutual quotation of each 
other." '^ Because half a dozen grasshoppers, (said he,) under a fern, 
make the field ring with their importunate chink, whilst thousands of great 
cattle, reposed beneath the shadow of the British Oak, chew the cud and 
are silent, pray do not imagine that those who make the noise are the only 
inhabitants of the field; that, of couise, they are many in number; or that, 
after all, they are other than the little, shrivelled, meagre, hopping, though 
loud and troublesome, insects of the hour." 

For one, sir, I do not recognise the honorable member and his half a dozen 
compeers on this floor, as my file-leaders, or as my fuglemen, in this cam- 
paign. I do not belong to the " Root and branch party." I shall not 
march at the tap of their drum . 1 shall not vote against any bona fide , practi- 
cal, mu] seasonable measure, simply because they originate it; but I give my 
constituents and the country notice, once for all, that they are not to judge 
of my sentiments upon the great questions of the day by any votes which I 
may give, or which I may not give, upon their amateur abstractions or 
their precipitate instructions. I shall vote for them, or vote against them, 
or not vote at all, just as it happens to suit my own views, and certainly 
not at all with a view to suit their purposes. 

The honorable member, in the course of a speech in which he has mis- 
represented and assailed at least one-half of the northern members of this 
House, has told us that he is a member of " the reviled Free Soil sect." 
Good heavens, sir! if they are the reviled, who are the revilers,and what must 
they be? Never, in the whole history of our country— never, since the ex- 
istence of political parties any where— has there been a party which, under 
the pretext of philanthropy, has so reveled and luxuriated in malice, hatred, 
and uncharitableness— in vituperation, calumny and slander— as this " re_ 
viled Free Soil sect." I speak of their principal leaders and organs, as I 
know th^n in my own part of the country, and not of the great mass 



10 

of their followers, there or elsewhere, who, I doubt not, are led along by- 
honest impulses, and many of whom, I as little doubt, are disgusted with 
the music of their own trumpeters. Never, sir, I repeat, has there been wit- 
nessed in (his country, or on the face of the globe, such an audacity of false 
statement and false accusation, as that with which some oftheir presses have 
teemed! Never have there been baser stabs at character than those with 
which soiTie oftheir speeches have reeked! 

I need not say that I have had my full share, and more than my full 
share, oftheir misrepresentation and abuse. I bear no special malice towards 
members of this House who deal with me in this style, because 1 know 
that, after all, they are but the instruments and moutli-pieces of others afar 
off. There is a little nest of vipers, sir, in my own immediate district and 
its vicinity, who have been biting a file for some three or four years past — 
and who, having fairly used up their own teeth, have evidently enlisted in 
their service the fresher fangs of some honorable members of this House. 
" Odisse quern loederis.'''' Conscious that they have wronged me, they 
now hate me; and having been thoroughly put down at home, they have 
turned prompters and panderers to assaults upon me here. Let them go 
on in their manly and magnanimous vocation. If they only succeed in 
doing themselves half as much injury as they do me good, they will speedi- 
ly merit as much of my sympathy, as they now have of my scorn. 

Sir, I have already had occasion, during the present session, to allude to 
one of the false statements which has been frequently made in regard to me 
at home, and which has been repeated here by the honorable member from 
Ohio on my right, (Mr. Giddings.) That honorable member's speech, I 
take occasion to say, as printed for the use of the fourth district in Massa- 
chusetts, is a mere tissue of perversion and misrepresentation, so far as my 
conduct is concerned. But the most that I can do, on this occasion, is to 
notice one of the charges which it contained, and in regard to which, it will 
be remembered, a direct issue was made up between us. 

The honorable member seems to have thought it important to his justi- 
fication among his constituents for liisvote against me for Speaker two years 
ago, that he should ituplicate me in the origin of the late deplorable war with 
Mexico. He knew perfectly well that my mere vote for the bill, by which 
the existence of that war was recognised, and by which provision was made 
for the rescue of our little army on the Rio Grande, would not answer his 
purpose. He knew that, whether that vote were right or wrong, it was 
given in company with those who were altogether invulnerable to his ma- 
lignant shafts. He knew that he could not strike at me, on this point, 
without striking also at Corwin, and Vinton, and Schenck, of his own 
State, and Marsh and Foote, of Vermont, and 1 know not how many others, 
from the North and from the West, whose characters would be an ample 
shield against all who should attack them, and whom he would not, then 
at least, have dared to charge as supporters of the war. And so, sir, he sets 
himself to work to prove me an accessary before the fact, and charges me 
with having gone to a Whig caucus, before (he war bill was introduced, 
and with having made an appeal to the Whigs, to vote in favor of a bill, in 
regard to the intended character of which I had no more knowledge than 
the man in the moon! Sir, I never heard of this Whig caucus, to the best 
of my knowledge and belief, until I saw this account of it in a letter of the 
honorable member to his constituents, eighteen months afterwards. And 



u 

difficult as it almost always is for any one to prove a negative , it is fortunately 
in my power, tins day , to furnish such conclusive testimony that I attended no 
such meeting, and made no such speech, that even the honorable member 
himself will blush at ever having mad: the statement. 

I have here a budget of letters, which I have rescued within a few days past 
from a forgotten pigeon-hole at home. They were procured two years ago, 
without my instigation, and almost without my knowledge, by the editor 
of the Boston Atlas, with a view to vindicate me from (his calumny at the 
time it was originally uttered. I shall append some of them, if not all of 
them , to the pamphlet copy of this speech , if such a copy is ever published. 
I shall only have time to read one of (hem now. 

Is the honorable member from Delaware in his seat? (Mr, Houston 
rose and assented.) I have here a letter bearing his signature, dated Wash- 
ington, April 1st, 1848, and addressed to William Schouler, Esq., Bos(on. 
I will thank him to tell me, after I have read it, whether it is his letter, and 
whether this be his testimony now. as it was two years ago, in relation to 
the allegation of the honorable member from Ohio. 

The letter is as follows: 

Washington, April ist, 1848. 

Dear sir: I have received your letter of (he 30th ultimo, and in reply 
to it I have to state, that I remember very well the casual conversation 
which 1 had with you recently in Boston, "concerning a meeting of Whig 
members of Congress, held on the morning of the 11th of May, 1846," 
and I will briefly state, at your request, what I recollect in relation (o the 
absence of the honorable Robert C. Winthrop on (hat occasion. 

That meeting was held in consequence of the hostile collision which had 
just occurred on (he Rio Grande, be(ween a portion of our military forces 
and those of Mexico, and 1 perfectly recollect that I not only attended the 
meetino', but that I also made some remarks in it, the substance of which I 
still remember. The meeting was not full, many members of the House 
belonging to the Whig party being absent, and I distinctly recollect (hat the 
meeting adjourned without coming to any formal conclusion on the subject, 
in consequence of (his fact, as was then mentioned, and understood by 
those present. I remember that Mr. Smith of Connecticut, Mr. Hudson 
of Massachusetts, and Mr. Giddings of Ohio, were present at the meeting, 
and appeared to iiie to be among (he most prominent of the speakers in itj 
and I also remeJIber that I had a few words of conversation with (hem after 
the meeting was over, and before we separated, upon (he subject of some 
remarks which I had made in the meeting. I have a very distinct recol- 
lection that Mr. Winthrop was not present at the meeting, and of noting his 
absence, as well as that of Mr. Vinton of Ohio; and my reason, if any 
should be required to fortify my memory on this point, for observing this 
fact, is this: I had already come to regard these two gentlemen as among 
the most experienced and" prominent members of our party in the House; 
and as one sat directly before me, and the other immediately on my right, 
during that session, in the House, it will not appear strange, I apprehend, 
when these two circumstances are taken together, that I should not only 
note but remember their absence on that occasion. Such is my distinct re- 
collection, and without wishing to raise any question of memory between 



12 

myself and others on this or any other point, I have no hesitation in giving 
it to you in compliance with your request. 

As to the meeting held some time previous, on the "Oregon question," 
as it is familiarly termed, I have to state, that it is impossible that I could 
have confounded it in my memory with the meeting first mentioned, as I 
did not attend that meeting, and knew nothing of its existence until a day 
or two after it had been held. 

I am, very truly and respectfully, your obedient servant, 

JOHN W. HOUSTON. 

Wm. Schouler, Esq. 

Mr. Houston. That is my letter, and I have no alteration to make 
in it. 

Mr. WiNTHROP. There are other letters here, sir, equally distinct and 
conclusive. 

But the honorable member summons Mr. E. D. Culver, of New York, 
a late member of this House, to his aid, and insists that Mr. Culver has 
substantiated his charge. Sir, I think it is in Sheridan's play of the Rivals, 
that one of the characters is made to say — "Whenever I draw on my in- 
vention for a good current lie, I always forge endorsements as well as the 
bill." Now, I do not intend to apply the offensive part of this language to 
the honorable member. 1 disclaim doing so. Still less do I intend any 
reflection upon Mr. Culver. But 1 say that the letter of Mr. Culver does 
little or nothing to sustain the honorable memljer's accusation, and that he 
must procure stronger endorsements, if he expects his bill to pass current. 

What says the Hon. E. D. Culver, in the letter upon which the hon- 
orable member relies? 

"In reply to your note of the 14th, (says he,) which came to hand last 
evening, I would state that I was at the Whig caucus, in the northeast cor- 
ner of the Capitol, on the mftrning of tlie 11th of May, 1846. The subject 
of our deliberations was the anticipated War bill. I think Mr. Winthrop, 
Mr. Vinton, Mr. Hunt, and yourself, and others were present and spoke. 
The precise sentiments advanced by Mr. Winthrop 1 cannot call to mind; 
but {\\e purport , the general scope of his remarks, was, that we (the Whigs) 
must not oppose the measure; ihixi policij would require us to support it. I 
do not recollect his allusion to the Federalists and the war of 1812." (It 
seems that this impartial cross examiner had asked some lading questions.) 
*'I think Mr. Vinton took a similar view. Yours was qWite the reverse." 

Now, sir, in answer to these thinkings and indistinct remembrances of 
what Mr. VVinthrop said, and what Mr. Vinton said, and what Mr. Hunt 
said, I have here a letter from Mr. Vinton, to say that he never attended 
that meeting, and here, within three feet of me, is Mr. Vinton himself, to 
acknowledge the letter, and to repeal the assertion ! While here again, is 
another letter from the Hon. Washington Hunt, to say that he was ab- 
sent from Washington on the morning on which the meeting was held, and 
did not return until the following day! 

Mr. Chairman, the most charitable explanation that Ccin be given of this 
extraordinary and unfounded allegation, which the honorable member from 
Ohio has so perseveringly bi ought against me, is that suggested in the letter 
of my late colleague and friend, Mr, Hudson, who gives it as his opinion, 



13 

that the honorable member may have confounded this meeting with one 
which was held in regard to the Oregon notice resohition, when he was the 
open advocate of measures that looked to war, and I declared myself in fa- 
vor of measures for the maintenance of peace ! 

But I leave the honorable member and his friends to find explanations for 
themselves. It is enough for me to pronounce the charge to be false, and to 
prove it to be so. Having done this, I now hold it up to the House and to 
the country, as a fair sample of the charges which have been arrayed against 
me from the same quarter. Ex uno, disce omnes. 

Sir, I have done with these personalities. Tiiey have not been of my 
seeking. They are unnatural and revolting to my disposition. 1 am en- 
tirely new to this style of debate. During a ten years' occupancy of a seat 
in this House,. I have never before had occasion to resort to it. I trust 
that I may never have another such occasion. But 1 could no longer sub- 
mit in silence to such gross and groundless aspersions Gentlemen may 
-wofe against me whenever they please. There is no office in the gift of the 
House, of the people, or of llie President, which I covet, or for which I 
would quarrel with any one for not giving me his support. But no man 
shall slander me with impunity. No man shall pervert and misrepresent 
my words and acts, and falsify the record of my public career, without ex- 
posure. If 

That career has been one of humble pretension, and presents no claun of 
distinguished service of any sort. But such as it is, 1 am willing that it 
should be investigated. Examine the record. There may be votes upon 
it which require explanation; votes about which honest men may differ; 
votes as to which I myself may have doubled at the time, and may still 
doubt. But examine the record fairly and candidly ; nothing extenuate, nor 
set down aught in malice; and you will find that I have neither been false 
to the North nor to the South, to the East nor to the West. You will find that, 
while 1 have been tiue to mv constituents, I have been true, also, to the 
Constitution and to the Union. This, at least , I know, sir— my conscience 
this day bearing me witness— that I have been true to myself, to my own 
honest judgment, to my own clear convictions of right, of duty, and of pa- 
triotism. And we all remember how justly, as well as how nobly, it has 
been said : 

" This above all — to thine own self be true, 
And it must follow, as the night the day, 
Tnou cans't not then be false to any man." 

And now, Mr. Chairman, I would gladly turn to some serious considera- 
tion of the great questions of the day, but I am admonished that my hour 
is almost exhausted, and I must reserve what I had proposed to say on these 
topics for another, and I trust, an early opportunity. Having once swept 
this offensive rubbish of personahiies out of my path, 1 shall no longer be 
obstructed in dealing with the weightier matters which are before us. I can- 
not conclude, however, on this occasion, without a few distinct declarations. 

In the first place, sir, I have no hesitation in saymg, that the admission 
of California into the Union as a State, under the constitution which she 
has herself adopted, is, in my judgment, the first and greatest measure to be 
accomplished at the present session of Congress. For that I am ready: and 
I shall bring to it whatever powers I possess. 



14 

In the second place, sir, I do not believe thatslavery does now exist, or can 
ever exist, in any of the Territories recently acquired from Mexico, without 
the positive sanction of law. And such a sanction, I, for one, shall never 
aid in giving. 

In the third place, sir, while I reserve to myself tlie full liberty to act and 
to vote upon every question which may hereafter arise, as my judgment at 
the lime, and under the circumstances, may dictate; I have no hesitation in 
expressing my opinion, that the plan proposed by the President of the Uni- 
ted States is the plan to which we must come at last, for the settlement of 
these exciting and difficult questions. I do not say that it is the plan of all 
others which some of us could have wished to carry out. But the question 
is not what we wish, but what can we accomplish. ''If to do, were as easy 
as to know what it were good to do, chapels had been churches, and poor 
men's cottages rich men's palaces." We must aim at something practical 
and practicable. The President has done so; and , by following out his sug- 
gestions, I believe southern sensibilities may be allayed, northern principles 
satisfactorily vindicated, domestic peace maintained, and the American 
Union preserved. 

And, Mr. Chairman, the American Union must be preserved. I speak 
for Faneuil Hall. Not for Faneuil Hall, occupied, as it sometimes has 
been, by an Anti-slavery or a Liberty party convention, denouncing the 
Constitution and Government under which we live, and breathing threaten- 
ings and slaughter against all who support them; but for Faneuil Hall, 
thronged as it has been so often in times past, and as it will be so often for 
a tliousand generations in times to come, by as intelligent, honest, and pa- 
triotic a people as the sun ever shone upon; I speak for Faneuil Hall, and 
for the great masses of true hearted American freemen, without distinction 
of party, who delight to dwell beneath its shadow, and to gather beneath its 
roof; 1 speak for Faneuil Hall, when I say," the Union of these States 
must not, shall not, be dissolved !" 

The honorable member from Ohio (Mr. Giddings) alluded, the other 
day, in terms of reproach and condenmation, to a sentiment which I pro- 
posed at a public dinner, in this same Faneuil Hall, on the 4th of July, 
1845. I am willing that the House and the country should pass judgment 
upon that sentiment. I am sorry that it is not better; but, such as it is, I 
reiterate it here to-day. I stand by it now and always. It is my living 
sentiment, and will be my dying sentiment: 

"Our Country — Whether bounded by the St. John's and the Sabine, 
or however otherwise bounded or described, and be the measurements more 
or less; — still our country, to be cherished in all our hearts — to be defended 
by all our hands .'" 



APPENDIX. 

Letter from the Hon. Samuel F. Vinton. 

Washington city, April 6, 1848. 
Wm. Schouler, Esq.: 

Dear sir: I am in receipt of your note, requesting me to state whether 
there was a meeting of the Whig members of the House of Representatives 
on the morning of the day when the war with Mexico was declared? 
Whether Mr. Winthrop was there, and made a speech urging the whole 
Wliig party to vote for the war; and whether I was there, and made a speech 
to the same purport? 

I have no recollection of having been present ai that meeting — and if I 
ever knew that such a meeting was held, the recollection of it has wholly 
faded away from iny memory. 

I am, very respectfully, your obedient servant, 

SAML. F. VINTON. 



Letter from the Hon. W. Hunt. 

Washington, April I, 1848. 

Dear sir: I have received your letter of the 30lh ult,, with a copy of 
the Boston Atlas of 23d March. 

The only answer I can make to your inquiries is to inform you that I 
was not in this ciiy on the eleventh day of May, 1846. I left the Capitol 
late in April to visit my residence in New York, and did not return till the 
12th of May, the day after the War bill passed the House. 

Mr. Culver is mistaken in his impression that 1 was present at any meet- 
ing held on the day to which he refers. 

Very respectfully, yours, 

W. HUNT. 
Wm. Schouler, Esq., Editor of the Atlas, Boston. 



Extract of a Letter from Hon. Charles Hudson. 

Washington, April 1, 1848. 

; Sir: In relation to the meeting of the Whigs on the morning of the 11th, 
I'will say to you, as I have said to Mr. Giddings in a full conversation with 
him on the subject, that I am satisfied that he confounds that meeting with 
another, which took place at another time and place, on another subject. 
The news of the conflict between our forces and those of Mexico came into 
this city on Saturday evening after the adjournment of the House. On 
Sunday evening some gentleman told me that it was thought desirable that 
the Whigs should have a meeting in the morning before the session of the 
House, as it was expected that the President would send in a war message. 
I went to the committee room in the morning, and found not more than a 
half a dozen there; we waited till near the hour of the meeting of the 
House before we called to order. The members came in slowly, not more 
than twenty or twenly-five being present at last. . I think Mi, Winthrop 
was not present. But I am perfectly confident that he did not make a 



011 898 426 2 



16 



speech urging the Whigs to vote for any war measure. I had strong con- 
victions against the propriety of any such measure, and if one of my own 
colleagues had made such a speech as has been imputed to Mr. Winthrop, 
I am satisfied that I could not have forgotten it. Besides, boarding as I 
did with Messrs. Delano, Culver, Root, and Kinff, all of whom voted as I 
did against the bill, the vote of Mr. Winthrop was a subject of very frequent 
ahd very free remark, and yet I never heard any allusion to such a speech, 
nor, indeed, to any speech of Mr. Winthrop made in caucus on the morn- 
ing of the 11th May during that or the following session — the first intima- 
tion of such a speech coming to my knowledge since Mr. Winthrop was 
chosen Speaker. My impressions on this whole subject are the more distinct, 
because those who voted against (he war were immediately assailed, and on 
the l^th of the same month I made a speech against the war, and in justi- 
fication of my vote. 

The Whig meeting on the morning of the lltli of May was in the room 
of the Conunittee on Foreign Affairs; but the meeting which I think Mr. 
Giddings confounds with this was held in the evening in the committee 
room on Public Lands in another part of the Capitol. At the last named 
meeting Mr. Winthrop, Mr. Vinton, Mr, Giddings, and, I think, Mr. Hunt 
spoke; but this meeting was some time in the winter, and the subject was 
the Oregon notice, which had been recommended by the President in his 
message. In conversation with Mr. Giddings this winter, we both recol- 
lected (his meeting so well as to be able to point out to each other the position 
in the room where the speakers respectively stood when they addressed the 
meeting, and agreed as to the speakers, but differed in our recollection^ "^ 
to the subject under cousideraiion. At this Oregon meeting (here was a 
marked dilFerence of opinion between Mr. Winthrop and Mr. Giddings, and 
some litile warmth was manifested in the debate — Mr. Winthrop being op- 
posed to giving the notice, and Mr. Giddings taking the opposite view of 
the question, according to my recollection. 

I am, respectfully, your obedient servant, 

CHARLES HUDSON. 
Colonel William Schouler, Editor of the Atlas. 



Extract of a Letter from Hon. J. Grinnell. 

Washington, April 1, 1S48. 

I have to state that I have no recollection of any meeting of the Whigs on 
the morning of the llth of May, 1846. I never heard of any until the present 
session of this Congress. I do not believe that Mr. Winthrop attended any 
such meeting, for the reason that I am under a strong impression — I may 
say, that I have as clear a recollection of the fact as of almost any that oc- 
curred on that memorable day — that Mr. Winthrop did not leave Mrs. Whit- 
well's that morning until we left together, near the hour of the meeting of 
the House, and that we went to the House together, and it was called to 
order about the time we entered. I may add, there was a very free and full 
discussion of our votes on this bill for some weeks after, at Mrs. Whitwell's, 
and that I never heard of Mr. Winthrop's attending any caucus of the 
Whigs onthe day war was declared, or making a speech urging the Whigs 
to go for the war. 



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